But when all is said and done, it was a fun two-hour escape into the world of spies, subterfuge and violence. Lots of violence.
Kingsman: The Secret Service was a film I wanted to see when it came to theaters, but someone I trusted said there was too much profanity in it. But as I discovered for myself, yes, there is profanity, but not as much as I was led to believe. I guess we can be what we focus on sometimes.
The film stars Colin Firth, Mark Strong, Michael Caine, Taron Egerton and Samuel L. Jackson and was directed and written by Matthew Vaughn (Kick-Ass and X-Men film franchises.)
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Kingsman borders between cartoon fun and serious spy actioner.
We are introduced to a scene where a spy gets killed and Harry Hart (Firth) swears he will watch over that man's family if he can. 17 years later we are introduced to a troubled street kid Gary 'Eggsy' Unwin, that son. After his father's death, his mother imploded and started shacking up with all kinds of terrible men, including the all-around abusive asshole she's with now.
Gary gets into trouble because he stole a street bullies' car but finds himself being let out of the police station because Harry used his influence to get him released.
Harry convinces him to take a swing at the 'job applicant testing' for the Kingsman service, all the while, a nutty tech genius called Valentine (Jackson) has hatched a plan to save the Earth... by killing off most of humanity.
Nothing subtle there now, is there?
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A lot of the film follows the training of Gary (Egerton) and his peers, where they are all vying for a single spot into the Kingsman service. It's grueling, both physically and mentally. To stress how grueling, the school has everyone put their own names with a list of next of kin on body bags they keep at their bunks.
That sort of drives the point home just how tough this testing or job interview, can be.
All the while, this Valentine character, a multi-billionaire, is building up his plan to smite humanity. I mean, he really does care about the planet and all!
Did I mention Mark Hammill is in thie movie? No? Well, you'll see.
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If you were to take a James Bond action film and make James Bond the perfect fighting machine, meaning, that the fights were all precise and deadly action, then this is what it would look like.
I'm not knocking the fisticuffs. Not by a long shot. The scraps are awesome to watch as Kingsman agents can give and take with the not only the best of them, but with many, many of them at one time.
What did irk me was that when a Kingsman lost, they lost in such a simple fashion that seemed anti-climatic after all the knife and bullet dodging. But that's just me.
The character building in the story is acceptable, though again, there are quirks in some of the details or lack thereof on some of the characters. But not enough to have it hamper the obvious popcorn-fun atmosphere this film brings forth.
You know... that's it... It's secret agent Popcorn comic book fun. And since the film was based on a comic book, that just about makes sense!
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All in all, Firth delivered the stern and caring, highly skilled secret agent role nicely.
Michael Caine played his part to what you might expect of him, while Egerton gave us a young secret agent learning on-the-fly just a bit shy of just right.
To be honest, the most characterization that came spilling out of the movie was a toss up between Hamill and Jackson. Though if I had to describe Jackson's portrayal, it would be like his character in the credit card ads he does, but just an evil, sarcastic version.
But when you roll it all up into one big, two-hour fight fest, well, you have yourseslf one fun film.
And yes, "Manners maketh the man." Indeed.
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Generally speaking, IMDb users gave the film an 8/10, with some of the highest scores coming from those under 18. But older skewing viewers still came in with scores just over 7.
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FYI:
The film is rated R, and for a few good reasons. There are some intense fight scenes, a fair amount of profanity (mostly from Jackson's character), head shots are the kill of the day and at the end, our hero/secret agent gets the girl.
And that's all fine and dandy if you don't mind your kids watching that stuff. But there's a quick, near porn moment at the end of the third act.
To be more precise, he finds a prisoner who is a princess, says he's never kissed a princess, and she offers up something deviant that YOU DO NOT WANT TO HAVE TO EXPLAIN TO YOUR KIDS EVER, if he saves the world.
That moment was a bit surprising, considering how sexually benign the film is, and then it goes to this three-second total extreme near the end.
All in all, I would not have minded seeing it in theaters, and maybe I will try to catch the sequel when it comes out. Yes, there is one coming.
If you like your action flicks, you cannot go wrong with this one and would be a worthy rental or if you see it come up on your pay channel, record or watch it...
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